Night of the Paperbush

A storm of bloodshed was defused by Lu Zhi's casual remark that he welcomed it willingly.

Lu Zhi's fans had their keyboards ready to smoke. They were just waiting for Lu Zhi to give the order so they could curse Shen Ranxin's ancestors for eighteen generations. Then that one line about welcoming it willingly completely broke them.

[No, bro, he nearly beat you to death just now, and you're still saying you welcome it willingly?]

[He really loves him so much. I surrender. Shen Ranxin, our President Lu has gone this far already, so please be a little nicer to him!]

[President Lu, did you eat something dirty? I told you love-brains aren't edible! Spit it out right now, ahhhhh!!!!]

[I was wondering why there were fewer wild vegetables on the mountain lately. Did President Lu secretly go digging for wild vegetables behind our backs?]

[??? You damned love-brain, you may welcome it willingly, but have you considered whether I can take it? I passionately ordered two keyboards and speed-reviewed Shen Ranxin's scandals, ready to charge into battle for you! And yet you made me lose so miserably!]

Director Chen was clearly stunned by this hopeless love-brain as well. After a moment of silence, he took two Quick-Acting Heart Rescue Pills and had the staff carry the equipment downstairs.

*

When the scene shifted, Shen Ranxin and Lu Zhi were seated at opposite ends of the sofa while the accompanying doctor treated their injuries.

"Are you filming a dating show or an action movie?" the doctor asked coldly. He bent down to apply medicine to Shen Ranxin, then shot Lu Zhi a sidelong glance. "His gland was nearly bitten to pieces. What kind of grudge is this? He's an Alpha. Why did you bite his gland?"

Lu Zhi's face turned pale. The fingers at his side curled tighter. He secretly glanced at Shen Ranxin, and seeing that he had his eyes closed as though resting, pursed his lips without speaking.

After the doctor finished nagging Lu Zhi and treated Shen Ranxin's wounds, he finally went over to examine Lu Zhi.

Lu Zhi stood up. "I'm not used to being examined in front of the cameras. Let's go to the room."

The accompanying doctor sighed and followed Lu Zhi into the room.

He had been Instant Heart's accompanying doctor for years. He remembered that his workload had not used to be this heavy.

Lu Zhi sat down in the room and silently took off his shirt.

The accompanying doctor instantly sucked in a sharp breath.

Lu Zhi's injuries were no lighter than Shen Ranxin's. Moreover, Shen Ranxin was the underhanded sort—when he hit someone, he specifically targeted places that could not be seen.

On the surface, Lu Zhi only had some scraped skin on his face. In reality, there was a huge bruise on his abdomen from Shen Ranxin's first kick.

His shoulder blade was bruised as well, with large patches spreading outward like the veins of a spiderweb.

The accompanying doctor tremblingly gave Lu Zhi a full-body examination, then made the shocking discovery that Lu Zhi might have even broken two fucking ribs!

"You need to go to the hospital for a full examination." Still shaken, the accompanying doctor said, "Why didn't you say your injuries were this serious? Two broken ribs—don't you know that hurts?"

Lu Zhi's expression did not change. "Doctor, do you have Alpha sedatives with you?"

The accompanying doctor paused. "Alpha sedatives need to be requested from a specialized medical department. They're only used for certain extremely special circumstances. They cause a degree of damage to an Alpha's nerves, so they generally aren't used lightly... But just in case, I applied for two before coming here. Why are you asking?"

"I need them." Lu Zhi put his shirt back on. "Give them to me."

The accompanying doctor said blankly, "Your injuries?"

"It's nothing." After saying that, he repeated, "I need sedatives, and I need a lot of them. Please help me get a few more. I'll pick them up tomorrow."

With that, he opened the door and walked out.

Doctor: "..."

Alphas had strong healing abilities, sure, but broken ribs were not exactly a minor injury, were they?

Was this guy the ultimate love-brain?

At Lu Zhi's instruction, the doctor only said that Lu Zhi had suffered minor injuries. Afterward, he gave Lu Zhi several bottles of restorative nutrient solution and told him to rest well.

Because of the accident, neither of them went out to film that afternoon and instead rested in the house.

Fang Yu, Jiang Ye, Gu Yifei, and Cheng Cheng followed the production team's schedule and finished the afternoon's filming. They only returned to the little villa at dusk, dragging their exhausted bodies behind them.

Cheng Cheng went straight up to the second floor as soon as he returned.

"Is this a dating show or wilderness survival?" Gu Yifei sprawled on the sofa and voiced a question from the depths of his soul.

Fang Yu was exhausted too. "Why does a dating show require us to water an old lady's garden? A garden that's twenty mu large! And we could only water it by hand! I'm already this old. Production team, can you please do something humane for once?"

Director Zheng cleared his throat twice and said, "All right, everyone has worked hard. Based on your performance this afternoon, the production team has decided to award each of you one hundred and fifty points!"

Jiang Ye's eyes lit up. "That's a lot."

Compared with the fifty points from the morning, this was practically a windfall from heaven!

Without Shen Ranxin's ridiculous antics or Lu Zhi's outrageous flirting, Director Zheng felt that this had been a wonderful afternoon. In high spirits, he announced, "Now, please take a break and prepare dinner. After dinner, we'll begin the first round of Red Thread Pairing!"

Only then did Gu Yifei remember. "I don't think my Paperbush has been planted yet!"

"Teacher Shen planted it for you at noon already." Fang Yu patted his shoulder. "Don't worry. He picked the most fertile patch of soil for you."

Gu Yifei frowned. "Would he be that kindhearted?"

"Teacher Shen is actually pretty nice." Fang Yu smiled. "This morning, he just couldn't stand seeing you bully Jiang Ye, so he wanted to scare you a little."

Jiang Ye turned his eyes in their direction and belatedly asked, "You made me dig that pit this morning because you were bullying me?"

"I wasn't." Gu Yifei blurted it out, then felt awkward and explained quietly, "It wasn't intentional. I just didn't want to do that kind of rough work. If you want to blame someone, blame the production team. If they hadn't been so inhumane, I wouldn't have acted like that... Shen Ranxin is awful too. Don't think I'll forgive him just because of this!"

The great musician Gu snorted arrogantly and turned to head upstairs.

Jiang Ye asked, "Where are you going?"

Gu Yifei waved a hand. "To mercilessly mock certain people who slacked off, in the spirit of the working class!"

He went to the second floor and knocked on Shen Ranxin's door, only to find Lu Zhi opening it.

"President Lu..." Gu Yifei unconsciously took a step back. "I'm looking for Shen Ranxin."

"..." President Lu's aura grew even colder. "He's with Cheng Cheng."

As if he had seen a ghost, Gu Yifei fled at top speed and knocked on Cheng Cheng's door.

Cheng Cheng came to open it. Gu Yifei saw Shen Ranxin sitting in a beanbag chair on the balcony, a circle of gauze around his neck, lounging with his legs crossed like an old master as he played a game.

"Y-you, how are you?" Gu Yifei asked quietly.

"I'm fine. What is it?" Shen Ranxin raised his brows and looked over.

"Nothing. This is Cheng Cheng's and my room. I-I'm just coming back to rest. I wasn't checking on you." Gu Yifei walked over and sat down on his bed. "You reckless thing, you even dared to provoke Lu Zhi... You're definitely finished."

Shen Ranxin looked up.

If heaven had given him a second path, he would not have been so determined to court death!

It wasn't like he wanted to provoke him!

He was just a cannon fodder hopping around everywhere, a stumbling block on the protagonists' path to love!

His life was so bitter.

Gu Yifei leaned over and asked, "What are you looking at?"

Shen Ranxin said, "The sky."

Gu Yifei tilted his head up with him to look at the sky. "What's so interesting about the sky?"

"When people are sad, as long as they raise their heads at a forty-five-degree angle and look at the sky..."

The great artist Gu was inspired. "Their tears won't fall?"

"Some idiot will look at the sky with them."

Gu Yifei: "..."

Things like Shen Ranxin really were better off not existing in this world!

*

Because there were two injured people, the production team finally acted human for once. The guests did not have to cook for themselves; they only needed to hand over twenty points each to enjoy a nutritious dinner.

During dinner, Lu Zhi diligently peeled shrimp for Shen Ranxin, utterly disregarding his two broken ribs. The accompanying doctor watched from the side, sucking in breaths through clenched teeth.

Those two broken ribs were not his most serious injury. His love-brain was.

Shen Ranxin had calmed down by then. He knew he had not held back, and Lu Zhi definitely could not have felt too good either. That made them even.

After dinner, the production team gave each guest a red string.

The guests needed to take turns going to the little garden where the Paperbush trees had been planted and tie their red string onto the Paperbush of the person they liked.

If they successfully tied it onto the other person's Paperbush, they would receive tonight's sweet gift package!

Shen Ranxin did not care in the slightest what this so-called sweet gift package contained.

After all, as a background prop with an assigned role, he was definitely going to be cannon fodder in this segment by the sweet romance between the protagonists!